


The Search for Fatima Cristoban (Part 1)

by pallasite



Series: Behind the Gloves [155]
Category: Babylon 5, Babylon 5 & Related Fandoms
Genre: Backstory, Canon Compliant, Fix-It, Gen, How canon misled you, Human Trafficking, Psi Cops, Psi Corps, Rescue, Rescue Missions, Running Away, Sneaky Biased Writing, Teenagers, Telepath culture, Worldbuilding, telepaths
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-26
Updated: 2020-02-26
Packaged: 2021-02-27 19:20:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,493
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22900864
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pallasite/pseuds/pallasite
Summary: This is also a canon story - a telepath teen runs away from school, Sandoval Bey (Psi Cop and professor at the school) goes off to rescue her from human traffickers, and he brings Bester along to observe. But like everything in this section (from Bester's POV), there are important pieces that he doesn't know about, so I'm showing them. This is critical because the books attempt to mischaracterize these events later on, from the point of view of a character who wasn't there for any of it, and this needs to be explained and refuted.The prologue ofBehind the Glovesishere- please read!
Series: Behind the Gloves [155]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/677654
Comments: 7
Kudos: 5





	The Search for Fatima Cristoban (Part 1)

**Author's Note:**

> New to _Behind the Gloves_? What is this series? Where are the acknowledgements, table of contents and universe timelines? See [here](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10184558/chapters/22620590).
> 
> If you like _Behind the Gloves_ and would like to send me an email, I can be reached at counterintuitive at protonmail dot com. Do you have questions? Would you like to tell me what you like about this project? Email me!
> 
> I also have an [ask blog](https://behind-the-gloves.tumblr.com/), a [writing blog](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/pallasite-writes), and a "P3 life" Tumblr [here](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/p3-life) with funny anecdotes. :)
> 
> EDIT 3/7/20: Yes, Bey is station chief. Canon cite found!

Picking up where I [left off](https://archiveofourown.org/works/22888606)...

1\. After two weeks, Bey releases Bester from standing as "statue of the day." With his punishment over, his life returns to ordinary. (No one continues to harass him about having been a "statue" - in the Corps, when punishment is over, it's _over_.) He asks Bey if he can continue to meet with him, and Bey agrees. For three months, they have regular meetings, and Bey takes Bester under his wing and tries to teach him some life lessons about art, film, music, and getting along with other people.

2\. Around this time (late summer?), a student about Bester's age runs off. Bester met her briefly when he was a "statue" - she came by to harass him. Her name is Fatima Cristoban, and she's a later from Argentina who really, _really_ hates everything about her new life: being at a boarding school far away from home, being a telepath, being in the Corps, everything. She is miserable and homesick and somehow manages to get a forged identicard and run away.

3\. This is, of course, a highly dangerous situation. When Bester ran away three months before, pretending to want to "join the Underground," he was shot and almost killed by a rogue telepath by that very night. And the risk of human trafficking by normals is also very, very high, as we've already seen about fifteen years earlier, such as 1) [what happened to Talia's grandmother](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10867419), and 2) the INDUSTRIAL trafficking/sale of young telepaths by crime syndicates connected to major corporations, such as detailed in the canon story I revisited [here](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10841091).

4\. Bey decides he wants to bring Bester along on the search, 1. to reward him for having done so well the last few months, and 2. to be able to show the director that Bester really has reformed. He also wants to show Bester a little about the "real world" - what Psi Cops _really do_ in the field, as opposed to what he's read in books and seen in vids, and to use their time off-campus to show Bester some of the cultural sites of wherever they end up (if there's time).

Even more privately, he has seen the "writing on the wall" so to speak, and knows that the director is trying to lay a trap for him to have him arrested, or worse. He knows Bester is likely to grow up to be a Psi Cop, and wants a chance to show him how it's done... before it's over. And that means he has to take the opportunity as it presents itself - sooner, not later.

5\. Everybody thinks this is a terrible idea - the other teachers, the principal, etc. They don't want students put anywhere near potentially dangerous situations, and they worry that something will go wrong and get Bester - or Bey - in trouble with the director. But Bey is _Bey_ , so they end up deferring to his judgment. No one is actually going to pick that fight and tell Bey not to do something. They don't really have much time to argue, either, because they have to send a search party out after Fatima as soon as they realize she's gone.

6\. Director Johnston tells Bey he's _watching_ this one closely... and Bey knows he's watching for screw-ups be can blame on Bey.

7\. The Corps noticed Fatima had run away the morning before, and began their search. She had used a forged identicard, but it only took a few hours to figure that out. They didn't deactivate the card immediately, so they could track her movements - they saw that she used the ID to travel to Amsterdam - a city with a reputation for human trafficking of telepaths - and tracked her down to a particular hostel. So the following morning, at 6 AM, when Bester comes to Bey's office for their usual meeting, he finds Bey dressed in his MetaPol uniform, and Bey invites him along on the search for Fatima.

8\. Bey arranges for them to fly to Amsterdam _in a private Psi Corps helicopter_. This is how important Bey is - but somehow this is still lost on Bester. He knows Bey is somehow very important, but has intentionally chosen not to look up his public record or read what's been written about him in publications. (The only other person we've seen who had SUMMON ME A HELICOPTER! powers was Director Vacit.) The whole thing is extremely out of the ordinary - typically, if a student were to run off, as canon says, Bey would direct the search from afar, as the local office did the actual search on the ground. He got involved to save Bester because he'd made the promise to Vacit, and now he was personally getting involved to save Fatima.

9\. At this point in time, most of Bey's time is spent as an instructor, but he's still a Psi Cop. He's actually station chief in Geneva, which is how he can get that helicopter.

I assume, since his duties are divided and his main office is in the administrative building on campus and not in the Geneva MetaPol station, that he has his second-in-command there handle most day-to-day matters.

Canon does mention that he gets involved in cases on occasion - there's another case between when Bester runs off and when Fatima runs off, one that ended very sadly when Bey had been forced to kill a rogue telepath in self-defense, like he had had to kill Portis Nielsson Paris.

So maybe he gets out in the field once a month?

10\. And when he wants a helicopter, he gets a helicopter.

11\. Bester's like "whee, helicopter!" because he's never flown before. It's only the second time he's ever left campus - the hiking trip and ended with him running off to Paris and almost getting killed, and now this.

12\. And the writing is sloppy - this scene has Bey referring to the rogue telepath "underground" in Amsterdam as "the underground railroad," and _twice_. WTF? It's sloppy, sneaky, dishonest author bias... let's have a high Corps official like Bey refer to rogue telepath criminals (like Brazg and Nielsson) as the "underground railroad," as if these guys are really about helping escaped "slaves" to freedom!

And it's not done to show that Bey really sympathizes with these networks. He sympathizes with runaways like Fatima, not with rogue telepath criminals who bomb and shoot Psi Cops, and kidnap telepath kids to sell them to traffickers.

It's just bad writing.

That's how strong the author bias is in this material.

[The Corps is Not Slavery](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14312733), [Franklin is full of shit](https://archiveofourown.org/works/12827937), and I don't believe I even still have to say this.

Telepaths who run away from the Corps are actually kinda like [this](https://thisisrjg.files.wordpress.com/2014/11/tumblr_lph0u1p8bi1qfvq9bo1_1280.jpg). ("Bummer of a birthmark, Hal.")

13\. And you know full-well that that identicard forger in Geneva that she got the card from, he or she is part of this pipeline helping telepaths "run away from the Corps" into the waiting arms of traffickers. Telepaths are rare, and they are very, very lucrative. An identicard forger doesn't need to make a fake that's high quality for such a "customer," even if he or she says the card is that good - the forger just needs to make a card that's good enough to delay the Corps long enough for his "customer" to be picked up by traffickers.

\-----

 _Dark Genesis_ , pages 98-99:

They were over countryside now, and it occurred to Al that it was probably some of the same territory he had covered by train not long ago. Then it had seemed somehow overwhelming; now he saw it as a hawk might, a big place full of small things at his mercy.

It was a feeling he liked a great deal.

"Mr. Bester, I want to be clear about your position here. You are a student, and an observer. This sort of thing is not usual - I usually select advanced students from my class to accompany me, if anyone."

"I'm honored, sir, but may I ask - why me?"

"Think of it as a reward. You've pleased me, these past few months. I think you've come a long way. The Corps needs Psi Cops who know what they are doing, not-" He broke off and twiddled with his mustache, frowning, before continuing. "Anyway. I had to pull considerable strings for this. No one thought it was very wise, not after your last little excursion. There are some who will be watching this whole enterprise very closely. I want them to know you are now the levelheaded lad I say you are. Do you think we can convince them of that?"

"Yes, sir."

(Yes, the Corps needs Psi Cops who know what they're doing, not hot-heads who act out of selfishness, pride and arrogance, mess things up, and get people killed. That's what he was going to say, something like that, but thought better of it.)

"Good. I chose this hunt because I don't think there will be much danger, but that is never a given, so pay attention to me. If I say go, you go. If I say sit, you sit."

"Understood, sir."

(How he thinks there won't be much danger, I don't understand... even if he doesn't think there will be much risk of running into dangerous rogue telepaths there, he knows this could easily turn into a human trafficking situation and a rescue of Fatima from some very dangerous criminals, and sometimes there are rogue cells that the Corps doesn't know about, like the rogue telepaths Bester found in Paris. They had no idea those rogues were operating there.

So as I said above, the other teachers and administrators (not to mention the director!) thought this was a bad idea.)

"I also thought you might like to see Amsterdam. You enjoyed Paris, didn't you?"

"Well, sir, I was shot and nearly killed, so I'm not sure 'enjoyed' would be the best word-"

"Hah. I scanned you. You were fascinated by Paris, and well you should have been. You will be fascinated by Amsterdam, too. With any luck, we can make time for a brief tour. Educational, of course."

\-----

And this is where the scene ends.

This is, I think, when Bester first learns that it was Bey that scanned him in Paris. Of course, he _should have known_ , if he'd thought about it, and he'd realize that, but he _didn't_ know until this moment, and I think there must be a reaction here.

  * He'd realize that the director had explicitly refused to accept Bey's testimony of the scan to prove Bester's innocence of "treason" - even a man like Bey!
  * And he'd have mixed feelings about the scan. Of course, Bey was totally in his rights to do it, and would even have had the right to do it had Bester been a normal, because he was unconscious and, depending on the timing of the scan, possibly close to death. And of course Bester would submit to a scan (or even a second scan) to prove his innocence, as he tells the director.
  * At this point, though, it's not just about duty. Bey is becoming like a father-figure to him. Bester would now have it straight from Bey's mouth that that Bey didn't know about him simply from looking at his (Bester's) record or talking to his teachers, but because he had scanned him before they ever met, before Bester woke up in the hospital.
  * And that makes this different, and personal. This is someone who knows him inside and out - whether he likes it or not. And he'd have mixed feelings about that, because he can't trust _anyone_ \- this was the lesson of the Grins - even as he nonetheless does find himself trusting and liking Bey, in spite of himself.



So this piece is missing - showing him beginning to look at Bey like a father, even as he believes he _shouldn't_ , because no humans can be trusted, only the Corps, and it's the Corps that is his "parents," not any one person. Bey, meanwhile, is trying to teach him a different lesson - that the Corps itself is _made up of people_ , and those are the people he needs to know, to care about, and to love.

As much as Bester's point of view is the one that viewers/readers are left with as the most "authentic," he's one person, and no one person's story can ever stand alone. His view that only the Corps in the abstract can be trusted and deserves loyalty, not individual people, is self-fulfilling and tragic. (Life didn't really help much, however - every time he trusted someone, something would go _horribly wrong_.)

Bey, on the other hand, who also faced significant childhood trauma, repeatedly turned personal tragedy into survival and life, and never lost faith in other human beings. His story is one of resilience, one of honor and loyalty right to the end.

But readers only get snippets of this story, and the result is that they are left with this view of the Corps as a collection of lost souls, broken people, "victims" who need to be "rescued" by "good guy normals."

/sigh/

 _Behind the Gloves_ also revisits the Fatima story to make it _absolutely clear_ that Bester wasn't brought along on this mission so that the Corps could "brainwash him" by showing him only "what they wanted him to see" - to convince him that running away is dangerous when it really isn't, and that the Underground is bad when it really isn't. Those are the allegations made years later by Bester's first girlfriend, Liz Montoya, when she plans to run away. This is what she says when Bester tries to stop her, and warns her about what happened to Fatima.

It's an insidious and unhinged allegation: that the Corps knew Fatima would be raped and murdered, _planned on this,_ and that Bey intentionally brought Bester along to witness this gruesome, graphic crime scene to "brainwash him" against the Underground and "freedom"- that Bey, and the Corps as a whole by extension, was somehow out to hurt Bester, and not to help him. Yet this is what Montoya, in all her derangement, actually believes. _Yes, she believes it._ But that doesn't make any of it true, and since the book doesn't refute this - the authors have their own agenda to present Bester as evil _for trying to save her life_ \- it falls to me to do so.

I probably have fifty canon citations showing normals abusing telepaths - trafficking them, raping them, assaulting them, murdering them... it goes on and on. Canon's "good guys" do it, and canon's "bad guys" do it. Some attacks are random, some are planned, some are carried out by individuals, others by cartels, and others by the government itself. It's horribly consistent, in all time periods, on Earth and off.

I'm not here to sugar-coat things so fandom can "feel good." I'm here to tell you the truth.


End file.
